Solaris

Hello,

how can I use ufsdump utility for filesystem backup to a remote directory on a server dedicated for backups ( over network) ??

If you have a server dedicated for backups over the network, then you apparently have several other servers that need backing up? Why not just adopt Amanda? Amanda Open Source Backup. There is a wrapper I posted on the Zmanda wiki that does fssnap snapshots with ufsdump for Solaris. Backup client - The Open Source Backup Wiki (Amanda, MySQL Backup, BackupPC).

If you just want to try to do it yourself, the examples on docs.sun.com (in the System Administrators Collection for Solaris) depend on rsh and .rhosts. Those are generally regarded as not being secure. I would do it through an ssh pipe. I have a rather extensive script that does the same fssnap snapshot with ufsdump and can do it to a remote drive over ssh. I recently posted it so that people could look at it for reference. Minimalist SysAdmin Tape backup script for Solaris 9 or 10. You're welcome to look at it for reference and/or use it directly. However, it sounds like your situation may be better served by using Amanda.

You can use rsh or ssh. For example:
ssh remote_server ufsdump /path/to/fs

syntax and conceptualization of that is all wrong.

If you want to ssh to the remote server and then execute something there, then you need quotes around the "something." e.g.

ssh remote_server "ufsdump /path/to/fs"

But, the OP wants to run ufsdump and send that output to the remote_server to be stored there. Presumably, he wants to automate that. Also, ufsdump has other options that need to be dealt with. So, things get noticeably more complicated.

ufsdump needs to be run as root. You want automatic login with ssh certs, but you don't want to do that as root. So, set up a backup user, and setup ssh certs for the backup user (see OpenSSH Public Key Authentication for guidance.) Then run some variation of the following, adapted to your system and needs:

Code:

( /usr/lib/fs/ufs/ufsdump ${LEVEL}cnlTfuN 2h - ${RDEV} ${WHICHSNAP}; \
  STATCODE=$?; echo ${STATCODE} > ${CODEFILE} ) \
  | su - backup -c "ssh ${TAPESERVER} \"dd obs=64b of=${TAPDEV}\"";
STATCODE=`cat ${CODEFILE}`;

That generates the data stream from ufsdump, pipes it through ssh, and uses dd on the opposite end to put it to a tape drive. It happens to be embedded in a larger script, and is using an fssnap snapshot to do the dump. It also captures the return status of the ufsdump so that a script can take action based on the success or failure, or at least report it. That introduced a bit of complication, because that has to be paired with the ufsdump as a subprocess, and you can't pass environment variables back out from a subprocess -- thus, the code file to get the status code back out.

Anyway, I've already given the reference/link to the full script.